I almost interrupted your well-deserved break from this blog. I had it all planned, just a couple of days following the third lot of Vile Intravenous Poison.
"It's much easier this time! I'm doing fine! Hurray!"
The things that had bothered me most last time seemed easier this time round. The previously all-consuming nausea was only just edging in at the periphery of my consciousness. I managed to string my sentences together, merrily debating the Scottish referendum at the dinner table. My head did not droop quite as alarmingly. My husband noted that I seemed to be up and about more, and he was right.
Even Chemo Tongue was beaten into submission. He has been a fickle foe (the lemons that were indispensable during Chemo Cycle 1 now taste unpleasantly bitter; a craving for Indian spices has been replaced by a need for Chinese flavours) but I am constantly vigilant and ready to walk to the shops to acquire the latest weapon.
Things were looking up, I thought. There were going to be Theories, leisurely shared with my readers.
Have I been under-dosed by mistake? Or has my body simply adapted to the onslaught, not quite as innocent anymore in terms of chemical warfare and therefore better able to accommodate the poison, like an alcoholic needing more of the same to achieve the same effect?
Was it the joyful knowledge that it had been the last of this particular cocktail of drugs? No more Red Poison! I have been promised a different set of side effects for the final three cycles of chemo, and I don't dare think about those yet. But at least, I'm told, there will be no more nausea.
Or could it be Reflexology Man, having put Nausea and Frazzle Brain under pressure?
But then, the downfall.
Because with the slightest glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel comes Expectation and Hope and the start of a To Do List. Buoyed by my recent re-engagement with work, with friends and colleagues, with life outside my four bedroom walls, I am eager to toss aside the cancer cocoon that has served me well but now feels restrictive.
I am well and truly bored of having cancer and feeling ill.
Cancer is yesterday's headline news. When I was tempted to fire off a quick blog update, I imagined everyone sighing, Oh no, not again! just as they were about to turn those headlines into cat litter.
But when I try to harness my new-found readiness to move on, I find that I can't. Like warfare in the Middle East, cancer is refusing to move out of the headlines.
I find myself utterly floored.
Tired doesn't cover it. To Do List? Ha! You wish.
And with this overwhelming exhaustion comes an unwelcome bedfellow. He is the reason I have refrained from blogging (and today's offering takes a herculean mental effort). I am loathe to inflict him on the outside world. Torn away from my optimism by sheer exhaustion and a persistent inability to Achieve Things (even minor things), there he is.
His name is Self Pity. He has me weeping in the dark, when no-one is looking.
I hate Self Pity. He clashes with my sense of myself as a Positive Person.
How about all that lovely and profound stuff? Acceptance of life? Understanding that moods, feelings, emotions all rise and fall like waves on the surface, not fundamentally affecting the calm deep ocean underneath? Self Pity has no respect for such luxurious thoughts. He lowers my mood and drags me down.
I remember saying, in the midst of debilitating nausea/chemo tongue/etc: "Yes, I'm tired, but I don't mind being tired. If I'm tired, I can just rest."
But of course that's not true. When one complaint goes away, another surfaces, Maslowian-style. (When I start to complain about the weather, I shall consider myself fully recovered.)
Advice and reassurance from friends or family barely helps. Of course you are tired!! You need all your energy to fight off the chemo! That should be your focus! Don't worry about Not Achieving Things! etc etc. They are lovely, my family and friends.
Sometimes I remind myself to look back at how far I have come, rather than look ahead at how far I still have to go. That doesn't really help either. Looking at the long road travelled only reminds me of the length of the road.
It is a struggle, this cancer road.
The slightest sign of recovery, the slightest glimmer of hope, and I try to grasp back my sense of self-worth, which has always come from Feeling Useful. To my family, my friends, the world at large. Feeling helpless and useless is difficult for someone like me.
So I sink back into the pillows, trying (and, right now, failing) not to despair.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I just need to go and find a clean hankie.
"It's much easier this time! I'm doing fine! Hurray!"
The things that had bothered me most last time seemed easier this time round. The previously all-consuming nausea was only just edging in at the periphery of my consciousness. I managed to string my sentences together, merrily debating the Scottish referendum at the dinner table. My head did not droop quite as alarmingly. My husband noted that I seemed to be up and about more, and he was right.
Even Chemo Tongue was beaten into submission. He has been a fickle foe (the lemons that were indispensable during Chemo Cycle 1 now taste unpleasantly bitter; a craving for Indian spices has been replaced by a need for Chinese flavours) but I am constantly vigilant and ready to walk to the shops to acquire the latest weapon.
Things were looking up, I thought. There were going to be Theories, leisurely shared with my readers.
Have I been under-dosed by mistake? Or has my body simply adapted to the onslaught, not quite as innocent anymore in terms of chemical warfare and therefore better able to accommodate the poison, like an alcoholic needing more of the same to achieve the same effect?
Was it the joyful knowledge that it had been the last of this particular cocktail of drugs? No more Red Poison! I have been promised a different set of side effects for the final three cycles of chemo, and I don't dare think about those yet. But at least, I'm told, there will be no more nausea.
Or could it be Reflexology Man, having put Nausea and Frazzle Brain under pressure?
But then, the downfall.
Because with the slightest glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel comes Expectation and Hope and the start of a To Do List. Buoyed by my recent re-engagement with work, with friends and colleagues, with life outside my four bedroom walls, I am eager to toss aside the cancer cocoon that has served me well but now feels restrictive.
I am well and truly bored of having cancer and feeling ill.
Cancer is yesterday's headline news. When I was tempted to fire off a quick blog update, I imagined everyone sighing, Oh no, not again! just as they were about to turn those headlines into cat litter.
But when I try to harness my new-found readiness to move on, I find that I can't. Like warfare in the Middle East, cancer is refusing to move out of the headlines.
I find myself utterly floored.
Tired doesn't cover it. To Do List? Ha! You wish.
And with this overwhelming exhaustion comes an unwelcome bedfellow. He is the reason I have refrained from blogging (and today's offering takes a herculean mental effort). I am loathe to inflict him on the outside world. Torn away from my optimism by sheer exhaustion and a persistent inability to Achieve Things (even minor things), there he is.
His name is Self Pity. He has me weeping in the dark, when no-one is looking.
I hate Self Pity. He clashes with my sense of myself as a Positive Person.
How about all that lovely and profound stuff? Acceptance of life? Understanding that moods, feelings, emotions all rise and fall like waves on the surface, not fundamentally affecting the calm deep ocean underneath? Self Pity has no respect for such luxurious thoughts. He lowers my mood and drags me down.
I remember saying, in the midst of debilitating nausea/chemo tongue/etc: "Yes, I'm tired, but I don't mind being tired. If I'm tired, I can just rest."
But of course that's not true. When one complaint goes away, another surfaces, Maslowian-style. (When I start to complain about the weather, I shall consider myself fully recovered.)
Advice and reassurance from friends or family barely helps. Of course you are tired!! You need all your energy to fight off the chemo! That should be your focus! Don't worry about Not Achieving Things! etc etc. They are lovely, my family and friends.
Sometimes I remind myself to look back at how far I have come, rather than look ahead at how far I still have to go. That doesn't really help either. Looking at the long road travelled only reminds me of the length of the road.
It is a struggle, this cancer road.
The slightest sign of recovery, the slightest glimmer of hope, and I try to grasp back my sense of self-worth, which has always come from Feeling Useful. To my family, my friends, the world at large. Feeling helpless and useless is difficult for someone like me.
So I sink back into the pillows, trying (and, right now, failing) not to despair.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I just need to go and find a clean hankie.
Dearest Irene, the recovery and healing process is probably the one thing that most of us never really understand, and hospitals are not good at explaining. I remember the long recovery from Hepatitis A many years ago. I found I was telling people that I was better, and later realising that it didn't mean I was well; I was just better than yesterday, or last week or last month. So my expectations of being well were being laid upon a body that was only "better". And it's frustrating, limiting, challenging, infuriating. From a personal study of recovery processes, I don't think yours are tears of self pity; I think they are tears of acceptance tinged with inevitable frustration of the toll on your body and the long haul ahead. Certainly, you are absolutely not one to wallow. But I know it is hard to let others care for you when you've been the coper in the past. I encourage you to indulge them all! L xx
ReplyDeleteThank you Lesley... Now, where's my hankie gone? (That's the trouble with kind words...)
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